Boss’s Tip of the Week: Two Kinds of Problems

You will face two kinds of problems as a boss. You can solve some of them, like working out the vacation schedule, or making your numbers for the month, or adapting to being shorthanded. Most of your “accomplish the mission” challenges will be in this category.

But there are other problems, like helping a team member learn new skills or dealing with another who’s chronically late, that you can only work on. You can make progress, but you rarely get to declare victory. Most of your “care for the people” problems are like that.

You will save yourself a lot of frustration if you learn to spot the “work on” problems and make your goal continuous improvement.